RT Journal
T1 THe effect of caffein on the toxicity of acetanilid and antipyrin
JF Journal of the American Medical Association
JO Journal of the American Medical Association
YR 1909
FD October 23
VO LIII
IS 17
SP 1402
OP 1403
DO 10.1001/jama.1909.02550170058005
UL http://dx.doi.org/10.1001/jama.1909.02550170058005
AB The origin of the prevalent custom of adding caffein to prescriptions containing acetanilid, antipyrin, and acetphenetidin has not been satisfactorily explained. For two or three decades before the introduction of the "coal-tar" antipyretics, caffein was in somewhat extensive use as a remedy in neuralgic and other headaches, and it may be that this use suggested its combination with the newer antipyretics. Whether or not this was the case, there can be little doubt that at present the motive which usually leads physicians to add caffein to prescriptions containing these "coal-tar" products is a belief that it will counteract the depressing effects of the latter—a belief that has been long and a0ssiduously fostered by the manufacturers of headache nostrums. The clinical literature on this subject contains no evidence that caffein actually has this effects; the belief is apparently based on the pharmacologic action of caffein as a cardiac and respiratory "stimulant"